Do you have unpaid wages owed to you? Here's one way to find out

CLEVELAND — Chances are you likely know someone or have heard a horror story surrounding unpaid wages.

At the start of 2024, the U.S. Department of Labor reported it held more than $1.7 million owed to more than 4,200 Ohio workers as a result of companies that the department said violated wage laws.

Employees can search the Workers Owed Wages database to see if their current or former employer is listed and check if their name is among those who are owed back pay.

U.S. Department of Labor

News 5 obtained a list of all the Northeast Ohio businesses listed in the database and found more than $300,000 in back pay across dozens of businesses, including companies in home health care, landscaping, food service and security.

Here are the top 10 Northeast Ohio businesses featured in the database sorted by total amount owed:

(Total amount is as of Jan. 17, 2024)

1. Citywide Protective Services - $57,885.96 (Impacting 49 employees in Cuyahoga County)
2. Renaissance Home Health Care - $40,967.06 (Impacting 94 employees in Cuyahoga County)
3. American Made Bags - $30,901.59 (Impacting 77 employees in Summit County*)
4. Enterprise Home Care - $21,385.79 (Impacting 53 employees in Summit County)
5. Moscarino Landscape + Design - $14,447.83 (Impacting 98 employees in Lorain County
6. The Island House - $12,546.38 (Impacting 14 employees in Erie County)
7. Alliance Residential Services - $11,833.11 (Impacting 18 employees in Stark County)
8. El Patron Mexican Grill and Cantina - $10,119.90 (Impacting 7 employees in Geauga County)
9. Dayspring Transportation, LTD - $9,683.57 (Impacting 11 employees in Cuyahoga County)
10. Medina Creative Accessibility - $8464.29 (Impacting 9 employees in Medina County)

(* - American Made Bags had two different database entries, with one involving 35 employees and the other involving 42 employees. It's possible some employees could overlap between these two numbers and, as a result, were counted twice).

"The issue is far more prevalent than that," attorney Joseph Scott at Scott & Winters Law Firm explained. "Wage theft pretty much exists in all industries. It’s one of those things we’re going to have to be forever vigilant."

Each year, more than 200,000 Ohioans are victims of minimum wage theft, according to the Northeast Ohio Worker Center.

Like a game of whack-a-mole, Scott has made a career out of fighting employers over lost wages and recovering millions in the process.

Here’s what he says most commonly occurs when it comes to wage theft:

1. Daily paycheck deductions for a lunch that is never really off the clock.
   
2. Improper tip sharing where management takes a cut.
   
3. Time shift rounding where employers will alter time card to an official start and end time, even if work happens before or after.

"It seems like a small thing talking about 10 or 15 minutes, but it's my 10 or 15 minutes in a day and that adds up in the course of a year," he said.

Lisette Ponce's former employer is not among those listed in the database, but she told News 5 she's learning firsthand what dealing with those kinds of employers feels like.

She's currently suing her former employer, Bistro on the Falls in Olmsted Falls, for unpaid wages and other money she said she has lost.

Ponce said she worked at the restaurant for a month in 2023 before realizing what was happening.

"I didn’t know this could happen to me," she said.

Olmsted Falls police confirmed to News 5 that an investigation into unpaid wages at Bistro on the Falls is ongoing, and the Ohio Department of Commerce confirmed its own investigation into the matter as well.

News 5 spoke with the owner and his attorney on several occasions, and both repeatedly said they were working to pay the employee back.

"I do want to stop this from happening," Ponce said. "If we can stop one person, to me - it's a big win."

Clay LePard is a special projects reporter at News 5 Cleveland. Follow him on Twitter @ClayLePard or on Facebook Clay LePard News 5. 

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